10 Of My Biggest Pet Peeves

10) People who say they’re spiritual, but not religious: What does that even mean? That you hope heaven is like a pass/fail class in college and that by saying you’re spiritual, but not religious, you’ll be doing the bare minimum to get in the pearly gates? Does it mean you want the comfort of thinking God is in your corner without it getting in the way or your hedonistic lifestyle? Sorry, but it doesn’t work that way and people who think it does are kidding themselves.

9) Hollywood Stars talking about political issues: Sure, celebrities have a right to political opinions — no matter how bubbleheaded they are — just like everybody else, but they don’t have a right to be taken seriously or a right to demand that people go see their films, despite the fact that they’ve just offended them with their obnoxious rhetoric. Someone needs to alert the celebs to this fact.

8) People who play their bass way too loud: If I can hear the bass from your stereo when you drive by my house, a block away, it’s too loud. Play it loud if you like, but at least turn the bass down so that you don’t annoy everyone you drive past.

7) Needless Meetings: I’ve never been cut out for life in a corporation. I don’t suffer fools gladly, I don’t like taking orders, and I have always had a loathing of pointless meetings, usually because I got so bored I couldn’t hold my eyes open.

I’ve never quite gotten the point of having an hour long meeting to talk about a subject that could be easily covered in a two sentence email, but it was the bane of my existence in the business world. I would constantly nod off in these meetings and I got to be an expert at leaning over a certain angle and strategically placing my hands so that whatever boring manager was running the meeting couldn’t tell I was zoning out — until my mouth dropped open or I started to fall over, which has happened many, many times over the years.

6) People who stand in your way with their carts: When you’re in a Wal-Mart, Food Lion, or some other store that has precisely enough room for two carts to go through an aisle, why would you absent-mindedly block the whole lane and then stand there, staring vacantly at a can of peas while you are blocking my path? I hate having to ask people to move out of the way. They should be aware enough of their surroundings to just do it. It’s common courtesy.

5) People who don’t control their bratty children: When you’re walking through a store and some kid is making such a racket, running, tearing things up, screaming, or generally making such a pain of himself that you’d like to backhand him out of his shoes, it’s just stunning to see the kids’ parents standing there. Usually, if the parent sees you giving them the “angry stare,” they’ll give the kid a, “Now Johnny, you behave,” that you know they don’t mean, they know that they don’t mean, and the kid knows that they don’t mean. Good grief, people, get control of your children or don’t take them out in public.

4) Conspiracy Theories: There are wacko conspiracy theories about pretty much anything and everything these days, which makes no sense if you think about it. After all, how often are the conspiracy theories right? Almost never. You could simply disregard every conspiracy theory that anyone put forth and you’d be right like 999 times out of a 1000, so shouldn’t that produce a little more skepticism?

3) Telemarketers, Spammers, & Junk Mail: How did we end up being constantly badgered to buy products we don’t want and didn’t ask for via mail, phone, and email? I know, I know — capitalism and all that, but still, it’s annoying and it literally costs the rest of us billions of dollars so that a bunch of jerks can hawk unsolicited crap that 99.9% of the public doesn’t want.

2) Trashing People Right After They Die: Unless you’re talking about an enemy of our country like Castro or Osama Bin Laden, you should show some respect for the dead, along with their families and friends. What’s wrong with saying SOMETHING nice about a person who just died or, if you can’t even do that, refraining from saying something nasty about him until the body is in the ground? That’s just basic human decency.

1) Cell phone jerks: Sure they’re great for emergencies, but all in all, cell phones are an overall negative to society. Know why? I’ll tell you why: cell phone jerks.

They’re why your preacher has to tell people to turn off their cell phones before the service starts. They’re the people swerving into the lane because they’re too busy paying attention to their conversation to watch the road. They’re the people who not only get a phone call in a theater, but actually take the call and talk through the movie.

Can these people just not wait 30 minutes to talk about whatever earth shattering revelation from their cousin Bebe or their boyfriend Jimmy Jo Bob?